Learning from a Labrador

Our chocolate Labrador is named Boaz.  Boaz means “There is strength in him.”  He’s an aptly named dog. He’s a 95-pound, indestructible, food-seeking, eating machine. We call him “Bo.”  We buy the 40-pound bags of food for him and I’ve often been tempted to pour the whole bag on the floor and see if he could take it down. I’d like his chances.  I was in the kitchen cutting up the last of a rotisserie chicken today and there’s Bo, right by my side, hoping for any morsel to fall to the floor so he could pounce on it.  We eat rotisserie chicken about once a week so he recognizes the container and stands at attention knowing that some chicken skin is probably coming his way. There’s some good gristle near the skeleton too, but when I’m scraping meat from the carcass, I have to be careful that no small bones get mixed up in it or he could choke.  But Bo doesn’t know that.  He wants me to throw the whole chicken on the floor and let him have at it.  I can’t do that because I know what’s best for him. (You may say that chicken skin is not best for him either, but don’t be a party pooper!)

As I was thinking about that, I thought about how we pray.  Our prayers are usually asking God to relieve some form of pain or suffering, or asking Him to provide us with something we do not have.  We want God to give us everything we ask for immediately.  But God knows better.  He knows that if He gives us everything we ask for when we ask, bad things will happen.  When we are living in unbridled prosperity, we tend forget God and drift away from Him. Being disconnected from God is a bad thing.  It's often our need that keeps us close to Him.  Not only that, but there are lessons to be learned while we suffer and while we wait on God that we would miss if God were like a genie in a bottle, granting our every wish.  

I’ve heard it said that God answers our prayers based on what we would have asked for if we knew everything that He knows.  I like that. Since I’m not omniscient, I can’t know everything God knows, so I don’t know what’s best for me.  But since I know that God is good and that He loves me, I know that He will give me what is best for me in His timing.  If Bo knew what was best for him, he wouldn’t be begging for me to toss him the whole chicken carcass.  If I knew what was best for me, I wouldn’t be asking for God to fix all my problems at once.  The blessing is often in the waiting.  

Here’s another thing I noticed this morning.  When the chicken skin was devoured, Bo did not lick my leg appreciatively or otherwise rub up on me to show his eternal gratitude at this bounty of blessing. No, he continued to look at me like, “That’s it?  Come on, what else is there?!”  We do the same with God.  Many times, God has answered my prayer and fixed a problem that I could not solve, and 5 minutes hasn’t passed before I’m complaining about the next problem I have. I forget to thank God, and I’m consumed with the next thing.  I’m sure that I disappoint God when I have that attitude.  I need to remember to thank God for His daily and abundant blessings in my life.  Every one of them is an act of pure grace on His behalf.  He owes me nothing, and gives me so much.  Yet, I act like I am somehow entitled to more, like He owes me everything.  

Remember that God gave us His Son to die a shameful and agonizing death on a cross to pay for our sins so we could have eternal life if we will believe in Him for our salvation. As if that wasn’t enough, Romans 8:32 says, “He who did not spare His own Son, but delivered Him over for us all, how will He not also with Him freely give us all things?”  He will not withhold any good thing from us, but let Him decide when we should have it. He knows what’s best for us.  In the meantime, don't forget to thank Him for the blessings He has already given you, and don’t miss the lessons that He has for you while you wait.